Hey everyone, this is my email from last week that i wasnt able to send for resons that i will give in my email today!
Dear family and friends (Its kind of wierd to say that in engish haha)
Well what a crazy week it has been. thanks for all the emails and updates on everything! I sometimes forget how life is in the states because crazy guatemala is kind of the norm now haha. As far as st patricks day goes, i totally forgot it even existed. Here it doesnt exist, so i didnt even wear a green tie or nothing. I did give a talk in church yesterday about la obra misional, after all these little kids got up and bore thier testimonies about the temple. (The primary went to the temple in xela saturday) That was as exiting as my st patricks day went haha.
Well the big news of this past week was the baptism of Alex. So we had everything planned out and todo, and earlier in the week we did divisions with the zone leaders so that they could do the baptismal interview with alex. Basically everything was all good except for the fact that we found out he wasnt married!!!! He told us he had been with his wife for 30 years and they have like 5 kids together, and apperantly they were never married!!!! All i can say is that this kind of thing only happpens in Guatemala haha. Pretty much we had no idea, so we had 3 days to get all his papers for him and his wife together so that they could get married before the baptism of Alex saturday. but something more is that the wife first of all doesnt want anything to do with the church because she goes to an evangelical church, and also, she didnt have the equvalent of an ID so that we could get these marriage papers out. Wow what a process it was, and to make a long story short for times sake, basically we spent the couple days before the baptism saturday scrambling all over the place getting all these papers and talking to lawyers and making sure that we could do it. We saw some real miracles this past week as we did all that. first off, that fact that we were able to get out all the papers for alex and his wife without ID and without problems is a miracle in of itself, and the fact that we could do it and coordinate everything with a lawer in like 3 days was a miracle. AND that in the end the wife was completely ok and excited to get married so that alex could get baptized this saturday. Wow, i dont know if ive ever seen so many visible and frank blessings and miracles in my life as that. So pretty much Elder Galvez and i were super thankful and excited that everything could work out.
So we ended up having the wedding and the baptism saturday night so that we could get everyone there and do everything in one meeting. So once again the baptism was scheduled for 6:00, but people didnt show up until 6:30 and Alex himself didnt show up until almost 7! so that was super stressful with bishop breathing down my neck and people getting all angry at us because we were starting late and it wasnt even our fault, but in the end everyone arrived and we were able to start. There were actually for the first time in my mission a ton of people in the baptism, almost to the point were there wasnt anyroom for everyone. It was super awesome and the talks were super spiritual which was perfect that the wife of alex could feel the spirit and feel a desire to know more about the church. Basically it was super bomb and i had the opportunity to baptize alex which is always an awesome privelege.
Well it was a busy week to say the least and Elder Galvez and i are getting along better, and we were able to get out and do some really awesome things. The only other big news this week is that we have changes this wednesday where 40 new missionaries are coming into the mission, so who knows, by this time next week i could be training and in a new area or opening Catarina 2!!! So ill be sure to let you all know.
My thought of the week is something that i have been thinking a lot about and struggling with too. Amor. (Love) Im not talking about gushy love and all that haha, but the pure love of christ. I dont know what happened but lately we have been recieving a lot of persecution in the are, with people yelling at us, throwing things at us and people being straight up rude and what not towards us. Its been a really big struggle for me to get over my initial reaction of anger when people are just plain inconsiderate or persecute us. Its been a struggle for me to have love for my companion when he does stupid things or is just inconsiderate or rude towards me, or when people are just so rude to us in the street or when we contact. Its something that they teach us and that we learn all the time that we need to have love for the people here and our companions if we want to have the spirit with us and to have success. I have been trying really hard to have more charity and lovefor these people that i am here to serve and my companion as it says in Moroni 7. So i have undertaken it as my own persoanl challenge for myself and for all of you. To read Moroni 7, Mathew 22: 36-39 and to pray and try to have more love for one another in our own families, friends or with people that may have offended you. i am going to try to do that more this week and try to have an awesome experience for you all next week and it would be cool if you could all try to have an experience where you were able to show christlike love towards someone in this next week! Well sorry this letter is kind of all over the place, but once again im out of time, so i will just say again that i love you all and hope for the best this next week. You are in my prayers and heart! Hasta la próxima semana, yo quiero que sepan el amor que tengo para cada uno de ustedes, y que yo aprecio su amor y apoyo. Tengan feliz semana!!!!!
-Elder Henderson
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